Rustic sphinx
Manduca rustica
The rustic sphinx is a big hawk moth from the warm parts of the Americas. It is very good at living almost anywhere, from rainforests to deserts and even busy cities. Its caterpillar is a hornworm.
Lives in
From the southern USA through Mexico and Central America to Uruguay
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. The moth cannot bite or sting.
What does it eat?
The caterpillars eat jasmine, trumpet vines, desert willow and many other plants.
How fast is it?
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
Rustic sphinx about 45 km/h (28 mph)
A car driving in town about 50 km/h (31 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
It lives in very different places, from rainforests to deserts, and does well in towns.
2
Its caterpillars can eat plants from many different plant families, both wild and planted ones.
3
Some kinds of it live only on islands, like the Galápagos and the Caribbean islands.
you asked
Most asked questions about Rustic sphinx
?What does the rustic sphinx caterpillar eat?
Jasmine, trumpet vines, desert willow and many other plants.
?Where does the rustic sphinx live?
From the southern USA all the way to Uruguay, even in cities.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Manduca rustica
- Named by
- Fabricius, 1775
- Group
- Moths
- Family
- Sphingidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Lepidoptera > Sphingidae
- Lives on
- North America, South America
Where the facts come from
- Manduca rustica (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by pondhawk. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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